This house was built using the latest ‘green’ construction techniques and I laud the owner, designer and contractor for that effort:
This is also, in case you can’t tell from the picture, a large house:
This hilltop site in Corte Madera was once home to the late rock impresario Bill Graham.
Today it holds what its designer says is probably the largest “green” – ecologically correct – house in America.
Designed by Inverness architect Sim Van der Ryn and under construction for more than five years, the 15,000-square-foot house was built for owner Michael Klein, a passionate environmentalist and board member of the Rain Forest Action Network. It replaces the Graham house, which has been razed.
Exactly why is a passionate environmentalist building a 15,000 square foot house? Yes, he can afford it but surely a wealthy passionate environmentalist would set an example for both commoners and his wealthy peers. He would use green building techniques and also build a home appropriate to a human family in the 21st century. I do not believe a case can be made that all 6,492,046,339 of us (as of 01/18/06 at 00:09 GMT) should be living in homes this size as nuclear familys.
It may be a great show place for green building techniques but unless it is to be the home of 30-40 people there is little about it that is ecologically correct.
Via Knockin’ On The Golden Door via Grateful Dead News.
Hey there! Thanks for the trackback. You make a salient point about this house being an ecological oxymoron.
As a contractor working in this strata (and not getting paid in a timely fashion by those building such grandiose digs, my own home is exactly 1,187 sq. ft. A very comfortable size for me, my wife, her grandmother and our two beagles and one cat.
I intend to live here indefinitely.
On thje house in question on which I was recently working, I witnessed other hypocrisy in building which I will blog about in future episodes of Contractors Who Gert Bent Over By The (Green) Man.
Stay tuned!
Wow! Sorry about the triple post. I was having trouble with the comment modulator!
Ecological Blunder
“The Modulator” tracked back to my story about the Great Cosmic Fucking I am receiving right now, and makes a salient point about mini-mansions being built by the filthy rich, who aren’t just Republicans anymore (insert sardonic chukle): Exactly why…